In my mind this really depends upon Colson’s status. If he’s totally ready to go I take ND over the spread. He’s just such an active, physical player when healthy. It somehow seems fitting that Stallings should lose another game by more than 20.

I totally stumbled across a couple of gems in an article from Stallings’s days coaching Vanderbilt. These two stuck out given what we’ve seen of his style and the team’s play in 2017-2018.

“Leading by 12 points with 1:08 left, the Commodores’ veteran coach called a timeout to express his displeasure with his team’s complacent play. He attempted to drive home his point by emphatically slamming down his whiteboard. The clipboard smashed in half and the dry erase marker broke into several pieces, scattering across the Memorial Gymnasium floor.”

“There was just complete casual careless ball care, Stallings said. There are some things that happen because you are young and inexperienced. We’re not going to be casual around here. That’s not how we’re going to play. That’s not what we’re going to settle for. I needed to make a point.”

Wow. I have not watched much Pitt BBall this year…I love the innovative high powered fast pace “Pass and Chuck up a Three at the End of the Clock” offense and the patented “Rope a Dope” defense to wear down the other teams energy is just brilliant, Notre Dame will really be gassed in the second half from making them spend effort taking too many open shots is simply brilliant……gosh, this team really has some room to develop this year…what’s all the fuss about?

You have no idea what you’ve been missing. This is much more engaging and entertaining. Paul Zeise was right!

The old coach, Mr. Slogball, has a team that is currently in the Top 20 in scoring offense, 3P shooting, assists to turnover, and assists to name a few stats. He also has team positioned to reach the NCAA tournament for the first time in 20 years. Offensive moron.

I’d comment but I can’t keep it civil. There’s not a single Pitt player who will be playing D1 ball in 2 years. EMel…the reason they get so many 3’s blocked is the telegraph every shot ….then become statues when they get the ball. Please Dear God let this be Stallings last game!,

Why do I complain when the PITT hoop players are completely ripped apart? From above: 5 all ACC academic honorees the most in the ACC. The team is young and bad, they aren’t dummies, idiots and morons. as they have been called on the POV.

Ah, the ACC tourney bracket explains it all…Pitt is sandbagging ND tonight so they don’t give away their offensive and defense surprises early…lulling ND into complacency so they are surprised when they meet again next week when it counts and gives Pitt it’s best shot to advance into the post season.. Brilliant strategy, I say.

You may be on to something. While we technically do not know if PITT will fire or stick with Stallings, many would consider the writing as being on the wall. One example is that Heather Lyke was seemingly profuse in support of Narduzzi. That is not so much the case with Stallings.

However, a surprise run through the tournament is likely Stallings best chance to ensure job security. How could PITT fire the coach that led them to winning the ACC tournament in just his second year?

I think the players need to spend more time on the court practicing as opposed to the classroom at this point. These players may be B students but they are F players. Give me C students and A players any day. And please dont tell me these kids go to school to get an education. This is college basketball in the ACC.

and these GPA’s, what classes are they taking…basket weaving. And who’s taking the tests in these classes? And what is the grading curve? Its just a way for Pitt to pat themselves on the back and gloss over a multi million dollar losing season.

I doubt these players picked Pitt for the academics. They picked Pitt because Pitt was the only team that offered them a chance to play in the ACC. And I can see that most of these guys couldnt start for Gannon.

Emel the names were called and you may imagine who called them. Yes I complained and he said he meant them. Sorry you missed the epic comment but I’m not going back an looking them up. Idiots and morons but not dummies were called.

Hey this senior big kid from ND sucked his first two years and he wanted to quit and go back home. He mature and grew up and became more than serviceable. It can happen with Terrell Brown?

These players don;t want to lose. They believe they are better than this and will be over recruited in year two. But the change has to occur in mens BB and womens BB. Clean house and hire coaches who can begin the change in Pitt;s BB fortunes. Not sure how much the 7 million is for Pitt athletics but with that and boosters Pitt can begin the search for a coach that checks all the boxes.

Right Chet….if Pitt makes a coaching change, the 2 best players come back regardless. Luther & the bearded juco kid. The others can all walk or come back it doesn’t really matter. I doubt many schools in a major basketball conference will be asking for their services.

Ike…even up..is fine. I scouted HS Basketball for 15 years. Each one of these Pitt players is permanately broken in one part of their game. It’s why they were available to come to Pitt. KS couldn’t get a single players to commit that had any talent at all. He tried but had 13 turn downs and the AAU coaches were particularly unkind to him. I will concede that Brown may be that one player. We need a change badly in both men’s and women’s B-ball.

I dislike everything I’ve seen from Heather so far. I’m glad Nard likes her. If she can fix this, I will become her biggest supporter. Like Duzz…she is learning on the job. My choice for HC at Pitt is not a popular one. I like Tom Crean. But whoever she gets…Stallings must go.

Sorry Dan I missed this comment from you. You have way more experience in this department than I and you’re right. Not receiving better coaching this past year may forever hinder any progress in these kids growth. I’m thinking some of these young players have enough talent that maybe they can overcome some of their weak areas.

Luther, the transfer and a new coach who brings kids with him will begin the change. Actually Carr, maybe Brown can still develop/ Not sure who else can be a part time depth player in two years but I think Stallings with one recruit sees the end here.

PITT needs a couple more big athletic players but more than that they need and X and O coach. It’s not too late but PITT needs to keep the core of this team and if they over-recruit them then so be it. Starting from scratch with returning freshmen wouldn’t be the worst idea. There’s enough players at the end of the bench for bringing in new players.

Not to rant, but Duquesne has five transfers ready next year plus starters back plus incoming freshman. Pitt can begin the change over ASAP and I would be disappointed if the AD and Chancellor haven’t already laid the ground work to his the field running. .1972 Majors was coming by the end of October and his rep had already negotiated the deal. In all honesty, A search and interview and endless back and forth are just excuses. Stallings was a known bust and if Pitt has wasted time making an obvious decision now, WTF. this shoulo have been a no brainer. If you need a meeting now to explore Stallings future,that is comical. But if the buyout is the consideration so be it., .

Matta has some kind of physical problem which is what apparently caused him to resign at Ohio Fake.

Crean took IU from the OutHouse back to being pretty good.
Wikipedia says:

Crean’s basketball philosophy emphasizes fast breaks and transition offense. His guidance of the Indiana program to success from “unthinkable depths” was regarded as one of the most remarkable rebuilding projects in NCAA basketball history.[1] In 2012, he was named the mid-season Jim Phelan National Coach of the Year, the Sporting News Big Ten Coach of the Year, and the ESPN.com National Coach of the Year. In 2016, Crean was named by the coaches and media the Big Ten Coach of the Year after coaching Indiana to their second outright Big Ten regular-season championship in four years.

I like Crean but some very clearly don’t. Some liken him to Stallings. However Crean went to the tourney 4 of his last 6 years at IU and won 2 B1G regular season titles in that span. He’s been to a FInal Four. He’s had success in two major conferences. He actually brought IU back from the Sampson induced brink. Perhaps he can bring Pitt back from the Stallings induced brink!

I also honestly liked wwb’s take on David Padgett too. I actually like what Padgett has done at the Ville in a very challenging situation. Young guy with a reasonably good P6 season behind him. A good player in a storied (good and bad) program.

From 1990 to 1994 Crean served as the associate head coach under Ralph Willard at Western Kentucky. When Willard left Western Kentucky to become head coach at Pittsburgh in 1994, Crean was considered to replace him as head coach.[9] Ultimately Crean followed Willard to Pittsburgh, serving as associate head coach for one year.[3]

During this period Crean served at various times as recruiting coordinator and, for the last two seasons, associate head coach.[11] In each of Crean’s four seasons, Michigan State’s win total increased, culminating with a 33-5 season and a 15-1 Big Ten ledger in 1999. Michigan State later went on to honor Crean with a 2000 National Championship ring; even though he wasn’t on the staff at the time, he’d helped recruit and develop many of the players on the title team.

Stewart played 27 minutes with 7 points on 2-10 shooting with 4 rebounds and 1 assist. He also finished under 40% shooting for the season. If he isn’t knocking down 3s he has little value.

I’m not sure that none of these guys will be playing D1 ball in 2 years, but I doubt they’ll be playing P6 ball in 2 years. Any particular skill they have is offset by other deficiencies and completely negated by their poor defense. I’m glad they’re good students.

Agree Warriors kid is a one trick pony, for a 6’4″ kid is not able to compete at all near the rim. He had
a couple games where he had some open looks and they went in. He needs an offense where he comes off several Screens to get open looks.

Regarding this and other season long observations about these players, I’ve been wondering if Pitt really got fully committed, serious effort from any ACC opponent this year. Three games that particularly stood out to me were NC State, Florida State, BC, and Miami (at FL). Pitt was competitive for large chunks of those games and then it seemed like the opponent turned it up and pulled away. I can almost hear the coach in a timeout saying “If you don’t start playing seriously now you could actually lose to these guys!”

With particular regard to Stewart, there were a number of games where he was left alone at the arc despite having earned a certain reputation as a serious 3P threat. That’s either bad scouting and preparation or really poor execution. Nobody should ever leave him on the arc. That’s the only way he’s a threat.

It seemed that way to me as well. Most of the games were like NBA extended garbage time. Both teams run up and down the court, little defense on either side. Pitt’s not by design btw and lots of open looks for both teams just like NBA garbage time. Those games you mentioned those teams all missed tons of shots, close in and shot in the 20 – 30% area in the 1st half of those games. Again not because of Pitt’s defense.

Ryan Luther ended up tied for the team lead in offensive rebounds. He finished third in rebounding. He finished sixth in points. He finished tied for third in steals. Luther ended up second on the team in FG% and third in 3P%.

Shows 2 things. How poor the rest of the team tries to rebound, which shows a lack of effort.

Secondly, how weak Pitt’s non-con was. cause all the teams’ shooting %’s were far greater against
the scrub non-con.

We still wouldn’t have won any games in the ACC because teams would have played a tad harder with
Luther in the lineup, instead of the almost lackadaisical way most of them played for most of the games.
Except as you mentioned above…..they ‘turned it on’ usually at end of halves or games to win easily.

You must have missed this part “Colson hadn’t played in 2 months”. He played in the ACC opener and has missed 15 games since. That means he’s had no game action at all. You’re trivializing that fact. You’re also trivializing that he did it in half the minutes. Blinders?

For what feels liked the millionth time, Chukwuka is a sophomore.

As usual you don’t understand. The point about Luther isn’t that he’s a great player. He was a 3 year bench player. The point is that he is head and shoulders above everybody else on this team despite not having played much.

These stout “freshmen” (some 20 years old) have been playing ACC ball for an entire season now and still can’t play.

Since we’re sparring and all, did you have anything to say about the rest of the original post? I mean I did do something that you detest and “cherry pick” some stats there that clearly support my very narrow argument (seemingly shared by all here but you) but that surely don’t reflect well on the players of which you are so relentlessly optimistic.

Miller and Izzo claiming their innocence. These schools are not going down without a fight. I’d be shocked if anything happens to Miller. They taped him having a conversation….unless they have proof of the money trail, he is free and clear.

If Otis gets the boot….Luther will still come back and so will the leading scorer on this current team, the bearded Juco kid. Whether any of the rest of them do….. is almost immaterial, as any coach worth his salt can bring in at least comparable players to replace them and they wouldn’t have to unlearn, whatever system
Otis taught them. (if one can call whatever Otis taught them a system) (other than a losing system).